Proving Grounds first impressions

A revised list of fixes coming 16 May:

Just cancelled my sub. This GU is a disgrace, and as you point out, DB resurrected the most bugged out part of the game possible, and somehow made it worse. It's hard enough trying to gear out two main toons with ascension and everything else we have to grind. Why oh why couldn't they just give us some new fabled zones and stuff that we could do solo?

And to add insult to injury, my main is a dirge, which is useless to a group if people can't auto attack and we're stuck with basic stats. . .

I don't understand why heals are hard capped with percentages... so nothing that buffs potency, heals, etc does ANYTHING to help healers.
Basically the strat on names is kill them fast enough, because if you don't, no healer can keep you alive

Healers are going to get some PG love on the 16th:


Dunno how it's being increased, though, if it's being made more effective in general or the percentages are upped or what. Guess we'll see in a few days.

(And can I say as a shadowknight that the changes to self-heals in PG and on live are icky? (to use a non-filtered word))

Imagine trying to heal a group with those and you feel some of my pain in PGs
I did see that.. but I'm guessing it is just percetanges.. which will still leave classes (class?) with ONLY HoTs in the dust compared to the rest.

yeah making heals only percent based is silly. It makes Inq obscenely op because 5% of 4 million is a whole lot more than 5% of 700k. The heal mechanics really don't seem to make an even playing field for priest classes.

Not only were my heals "nerfed"/"adjusted" right before the GU, but if I have an enemy targeted and cast a target heal (Holy Aid or Arch Heal) there's a good chance it won't heal me but attempt to cast on the target enemy mob, which wastes it. Much like PQs where if I have the named on target, it keeps telling me "Not a friend" and I literally have to go back to EQ1 era 2000 mechanics of targeting myself first before casting.

The Epic 1.0 Defiler ability "Nightmare" does not work in PG, it says no target in range, no matter the distance or if i assist or direct target.

*mourns at the loss of yet another Shadowknight*

The more I've toyed around with Proving Grounds, the more I feel that whoever was the brainchild behind this idea should be fired immediately. They clearly have no clue what EQ is about.

Brownies should go period.

I'm not one to post here often (if ever), but this entire PG thing is just not EQ. I barely even feel I am playing my own character (you know, the one I have worked on for over a decade). I just returned after a year or so off, spent a bunch of time catching up, and now I am immediately contemplating quitting again. The gear in there 100% makes it required, and it is simply not even close to fun. As a matter of fact, I enjoyed mindlessly grinding faction last night for my epic 2.0 more than the PG. At least I felt like I was in Norrath adventuring, rather than playing some minigame that feels completely disconnected from the actual setting of the game.

This is the type of thing that hurts community as well IMO. By nature, this is something you don't do at your own pace, meaning there is no time for chat, helping others, taking a break, etc.. Just by my own observation, guild chat is down about 50% since the GU. People just logging in and out of the PG's, not by choice, but because it feels required with the inflated gear and tokens.

Unfortunately, the gear from running the PG makes it feel remarkably inefficient to do anything else (at least for those of us who want to be reasonably competitive).

^Could not agree more

why is there no parsing in this???????

I was kind of excited about the concept but then there are no damage logs so rip, completely lost my interest, back to other things now.

Cancelled my sub yesterday and it ran out today. I see no reason to resubscribe from those 'fix' notes, a dirge really isn't much use if auto attack is disabled. What a godawful idea DB, even if it was working perfectly it would still mean running the same zone hundreds of times to gear out two toons.

not having auto attack be a thing is actually dumb, like it wasn't free dps... it just dumbs down the game, people dont have to worry about getting as many autos as they can between casts

Well the thing is that most dirge buffs are MA, DPS and haste, and then there's Battle Cry, all stats that are completely useless in PGs when there are no auto attacks. I shouldn't have to roll a different class to be competitive on my main, and as I said, even if it was working perfectly I'm not running the same crappy zone hundreds of times for must-have gear. The stuff that happens outside the zone, like dropping group and resetting chat channels is bad enough as it is. I've cancelled my sub before when I've lost interest in the game, but this is the first time in 9 years a change has left me pissed off enough to cancel right then and there.

i agree it's terrible lol

Pretty sure there are auto attacks.

There doesn't seem to be any damage being logged, and it's a complete guess but I suspect the auto attack bar uses your logs to know when autos hit so that's why it's not working? Total guess, could be wrong. Still, fight a trash mob by yourself sometime and just don't press buttons, you'll see their hp drop periodically as your auto hits. You can also range pull with your auto.

ahh idk i tried testing but it was only for like 20 seconds before someone zoned in and ruined my test but my autoattack didnt bring it down from 100%. but regardless, no dmg logs like really? ruin all the fun

so update got on my berserker to test the whole autoattack thing, mobs hp didnt move 1% for over a minute so...